By Meticulous Meta, Former OnRPG Paragon City Reporter
For two years I wrote about City of Heroes on a weekly basis. I had the pleasure of interviewing everyone from Samuraiko to Warwitch. But there was always one man who I never got the chance to sit down with. Ascendant, better known in the real world as Tre Chipman. As City of Heroes came to an end I always hoped I would get the chance to interview Tre. Unfortunately it never worked out.
I woke yesterday to find out that Tre had died. Though I only had a few rare opportunities to chat with him, one time without even knowing it was him until we went our own ways, I was still moved by the loss to the City of Heroes community.
For anyone not familiar with Ascendant and his legacy I encourage you all to read what made him so famous in the CoH community. I could try to explain it here but it really wouldn’t be doing him justice. Needless to say he was a pillar of a community and the loss of him is being felt throughout the community by all.
The first time I ever heard about Ascendant was shortly after I started really getting into City of Heroes. I got into CoH for the RP, and to me Ascendant was the pinnacle of a hero. A fantastic roleplayer with a legendary status, someone who made the community stronger just by being himself. I wanted to be Ascendant, I wanted to be Tre.
But because I didn’t know him as well as I would have liked to I feel it is only appropriate that I share some of the thoughts of people who were lucky enough to.
I know many of you had the opportunity to know Tre in-game, and some were fortunate enough to even be a friend out of game. I wish everyone out there could have had the chance to realize what a great person Tre was, and how he represents some of the best qualities that represent our industry. – Black Pebble
EVERY time after that, when we ran into each other in-game (either on Virtue or the test or beta servers), whoever spotted the other first would IMMEDIATELY run over and shoehorn our way into whatever was going on at the time. If he spotted me (unless it was very obvious I was in the middle of filming and didn’t want to be bothered), he’d run right in front of me, flex, then whip out his phone to tell Saul to call me so we could set up his next commercial spot. If I spotted him, I’d run over to him, pull out the camera, and shove a microphone in his face asking for his opinion on the latest gossip in-game, at which point Saul would call him to remind him not to say anything too stupid on-camera. – Samuraiko
A character named Psycho Ex-Girlfriend showed up. I don’t know if Ascendant was the original target, but he responded to the cry of “YOU SAID YOU LOVED ME!” and what ensued had me in stitches and tears. That was probably my favorite thing about Tre, how he could just instantly respond to RP anything and make it fit, and make it funny while generally being the straight man in the situation. I was always in awe of this talent. – One Hit Wonder
I cannot empahsize enough how he represented the heroic spirit that binds our community (even the villains!) together.
One of my fondest memories was finally getting to meet Ascendant in virtual personduring the Unity Rally, and reading the script that he prepared for the event. It was amazing, as was chatting with him, and I’m going to miss him dearly from our ranks. -TonyV
There are so many other wonderful things being said about Tre all over the City of Heroes facebook groups, the Titan Network forums and twitter. And from now until the end of time every time I join a new MMO community I will be on the lookout for someone like Tre. And even strive to be like him.
You will forever be missed Tre. Thank you for blessing our community with your presence.
